Returning
by Suki-Itami
Summary: Her ancestors left the lands of the shifters, never wanting themselves or their descendants involved with the affairs there. Now, in the year 2009, the current leader of one of the shifter's societies has come to take her back to be the new leader.


**A/N: I mention **_**Twilight **_**in this chapter a lot because of a conversation and a character – this is NOT a **_**Twilight **_**crossover. And ignore the Rob Pattinson bashing, it's not me talking, it's the characters. (Though I still don't understand why "Cedric Diggory" was cast as Edward, but whatever.)**

…

As soon as I step off of my bus and onto the tall grass of my front yard, I run over to my car and throw my backpack inside the rolled down back window. I fish inside the right front pocket of my light black boy shorts until I grab the _Nightmare Before Christmas _key chain that holds my car key, my house key, and an assortment of other key chains.

I unlock the drivers side door to my guacamole green cavalier – I've been saving every paycheck I get from my job at Golden Corral to get the thing repainted to a more practical color – and slam it shut as soon as my feet were in the door. I start the engine as quickly as I could and back right out of the driveway. Damned bus driver is gonna be the reason I'm late for my dance lesson!

I shift into drive and punch the gas. Luckily, I'm used to the twists, curves, and hills of the back-roads where I live. Besides that, I don't really have to go the speed limit – which is thirty-five, and I'm going about sixty-five – here because there's no police that patrol around this area. Nope, don't have to worry about that until I get into Harrodsburg. And that's only thirty… I'm gonna be late…

Oh yeah, I guess while I'm just driving along here, I should mention who I am exactly. My name is Kayla Maser – my friends and family call me Kay – and I'm an eighteen-year-old Senior at Bedford-North Lawrence High School in Bedford, Indiana. I live out in Springville, Indiana, (AKA: The Middle of Nowhere), and I take dance lessons over in the college town of Bloomington, Indiana. Yeah, college town, Bloomington is where Indiana University (IU) is located. I'll tell you, though, driving in rush hour in Bloomington is almost hell on Earth – only second to my High School.

I severely reduce my speed as I enter the little hick town of Harrodsburg. I actually do that speed limit until I leave the town – about two minutes after I entered – and then I pick up my speed again. Ten minutes later, I turn onto the highway and click the "cruise" button on my steering wheel.

Ah… Finally, I'm on the highway! Now, I just gotta make sure that I don't get pulled over 'cause I only got twenty freakin' minutes left before my lesson starts. Damn bus driver!

I sigh and click the radio's "on" button next to my steering wheel. I turn up the volume as I hear "Life is Beautiful" by Sixx:AM begin to play. As I drive down the virtually empty strip of highway towards Bloomington, I sing along with every song I knew on the rock station that was the first pre-set on my radio. Finally, I turn onto 3rd Street and turn off the cruise as I slow down and turn into my dance studio almost immediately.

I look at my clock as I roll up the windows and turn off my car. A minute left, I can't believe I made it! I jump out of my car and lock it as I run toward the building that's obviously an old gas station. I dive inside the door as my teacher – Emily Cullen – walks into the room from her office. (She's gotten a lot more students since that _Twilight _movie came out a few months ago too.) **(A/N: So sue me, I'm listening to the damn **_**Twilight**_** soundtrack while writing this.)**

I can feel Ms. Cullen's disapproving stare as she watches me sprawl face first on the matted floor. "Miss Maser—"

"I'm not late!" I yell into the floor, knowing that everyone in the room can hear me.

Ms. Cullen loudly sighs and says, "Get up and go get changed! I'm counting you late, regardless of what time you dove inside the door!"

I stand up and sigh too. "Yes ma'am."

I sulk into the changing room – an old bathroom – and quickly change into black sweat pants and a baggy white Linkin Park t-shirt. I pull my black hair back into a high ponytail and walk out into the main room. I sit down on the floor next to my friend Christine – who is complaining about the damned preppy _Twilight _fans in our class who are obsessing over Edward Cullen from the movie – and start agreeing with her complaints. Rob Pattinson doesn't even look right for the part of Edward Cullen! I watched the movie while it was in theaters and was highly disappointed.

Ms. Cullen claps her hands together and says, "Quiet everyone." She looks down at me and shivers as we make eye contact. Happens every time, not even my friends can look at my garnet eyes without shivering. "We have a dance critic here today." She faces another woman with cropped black and garnet eyes. "Can you introduce yourself?"

"Certainly." The black-haired woman says as her eyes sweep over us. I could feel myself being the only one in the room who didn't shiver at her eyes. "My name is Zaria Cobriana. I am here to hunt a certain talent, certain dances that would impress a large audience. For one of you, today is your grand finale in this studio. Please, try your hardest."

Zaria takes a graceful step back and leans against the wooden rail as Ms. Cullen steps forward again and tells us to line up against the far wall. We stand up and comply with her order.

Christine looks over at me as we lean against the wall. "That Zaria lady looks a lot like you."

"Yeah, she does." I reply, not able to say much else. I want to deny the strong resemblance between me and this woman, but I can't. It's uncanny, as if she were my mother or sister. "It's…weird…"

"Weird is an understatement."

"Yeah."

Ms. Cullen, who'd been talking with Zaria, turns to the class and yells from across the room, "Mrs. Cobriana has agreed to watch you all before making a decision, so I'll be calling you up by skill level, be prepared."

"That means you're first, Kay." Christine laughs beside me.

I sigh. I hate it when Ms. Cullen does these things by skill level, I'm always first.

"Kayla Maser!" The teacher yells, as she reads my name off of her list – not that she needed it, I'm so advanced that she could look at me and know my skill level.

"Coming." I sigh as I walk out the center of the floor. "Any requests, Mrs. Cobriana?" I ask her with a little defiance in my tone.

She chuckles twice. "No, do as you wish. Please, call me Zaria."

I nod once and decide to do a _Sakkri_. If I can do this exactly right as I have been able to before, this should impress her enough that this will be **my** grand finale. I can finally get out of this hellhole!

I roll up onto the balls of my feet and cross my arms over my head for a few seconds. I've never really been sure why I do this; I just assume that it's part of the dance. Once those few seconds passed, I began dancing elegantly as the moves bypassed my brain and went directly through my body. As every time I danced a _Sakkri_, my body was as limber as a snake as I did every single movement with liquid perfection. Slowly, I fade the dance over to a _Sakkri'a'she _in order to give Zaria something to seriously think about. Only, this time as I'm fading dance over to the _Sakkri'a'she_, something happens.

I see people—no, half-people, fighting. Some are different bird types; others are different types of snakes. A poison tipped dagger just barely scratches a young man that looks nearly identical to me as he shoves a knife into the heart of the bird/man who scratched him. The young man became paler than he already was as he crawls off into a nearby small wooded area. He's obviously in pain; he's agonizing as the poison spreads through his system. After many long minutes, a young woman with golden hair finds him and holds his hand, singing to him as he slowly dies.

Then, as I start dancing the _Sakkri'a'she_…

I see myself, (Is it really me? Or someone else?), my hair is cropped into a pixie cut. I'm holding a brown-haired man's hand as we walk through the cobblestone courtyard of a vast and beautiful city. I smile as I look at him, though I internally flinch as I see feathers the same color as his hair at the nape of his neck. He looks at me and smiles as well, though I know he also internally flinches as he sees my garnet eyes. I know we're in love – bound to each other – and I know that because of that love we have to stay in this city, though I know my place is somewhere else. For a moment, I can't grasp at a name for the city, but suddenly the name comes to me: Wyvern's Court. A child with garnet eyes and brown hair comes running down the street towards yelling "Mommy" at me. I react and scoop up the girl I know to be my daughter, the princess of Wyvern's Court. The princess of a doomed city…I know her fate, but I can't bring myself to tell even my pair bond. One day, this city and its princess will die to the hands of—

I scream and fall down on the matted floor of the dance studio as I refuse to see or know anymore of whatever that was. I fell on my side and am now curled up into a ball as I cough heavily, trying to catch my breath. I feel a few tears escape my eyes as a harsh, cool pain that had settled over my body as I snapped myself out of whatever that was left me.

What the hell was that?!

I look up at Zaria, and see that she's giving me a look of fascination as I sit up and wipe my eyes and cheeks clear of the tears. I take a breath and look around as I felt my three friends Christine, Amelia, and Zach kneel beside me. They had run over to me from their places on the other side of the room.

"Kay, are you alright?" Amelia asks immediately.

"Y-Yeah…I think." I manage to mumble.

"You are **not** okay!" Zach says with a sense of urgency in his voice. "You wouldn't have screamed if you were okay!"

"What happened?" Christine asks, concerned but more calm than the other two. "You were completely and totally graceful, a lot more than usual. When you faded over to that other dance with no problems at all…that was so…just amazing. Then you screamed and fell. Did you pull or sprain something?"

I shake my head. No, I didn't pull, sprain, or break anything while dancing. I had a…a vision. But, was it a vision or a daydream? It didn't seem real…none of it did. Neither the battle nor the man with the light brown feathers at the nape of his neck. None of it seemed possible.

"Kayla, are you okay?" Ms. Cullen asks as she kneels in front of me when I didn't get up. "Can you stand?"

I shake my head to rid myself of the memories of that daydream. "I'm fine…but I'm not sure if I can stand. I feel kind of weak."

"Okay." She looked at my friends. "One of you three help her back to her spot at the far wall, I'll go get her a glass of water. Makes sure she stays seated, it could just be exhaustion." She faced me again. "Do you need any Tylenol?"

"No, I'm fine." I say as Zach all but picks me up and takes me back over to my spot.

As Ms. Cullen was walking into her office and I was sitting back down against the wall – yeah, my legs are really weak, I can't stand up at all – Zaria walks over to me and asks, "Your name is Kayla Maser?"

"Yes." I hang my head in shame. "I'm sorry about that. I really was trying, but…something…happened."

"It's nothing, I've seen much worse screw ups than that. You were really good though, very few people in my own culture can dance a _Sakkri _or a _Sakkri'a'she_, even fewer still can fade one into the other." She chuckled once. "In fact, my culture believes that those dances are sacred vision dances."

Vision dances?! That's what that was? It really was a vision, not just a daydream?

"You know the dances she performs?" Amelia, standing beside me, asks with a curious tone.

Zaria nods. "Yes, but it's been so long since I've seen a _Sakkri _**and **a _Sakkri'a'she _preformed that beautifully." She chuckled again. "Who knows, maybe the reason you fell down was because you had a…scary vision."

I…I did have scary vision! (Or, at least, I thought it was scary.)

"Here, drink this." Ms. Cullen sighs as she kneels down and gives me plastic cup of water.

I take the cup graciously and slowly drink the water. Ms. Cullen turns to Zaria and apologizes for my screw up. She explained that it usual doesn't happen, but Zaria just chuckles and says exactly what she said to me – save for the part where she said that she knows about the _Sakkri_ and the _Sakkri'a'she_.

As soon as the garnet eyed woman is once again leaning against the railing, Ms. Cullen says, "Amelia Lockhart."

Amelia nods and walks over to perform her dance. She ends up doing her favorite dance selection from the _Nutcracker Ballet_; we had to perform that last Christmas, it was hard. I mean, I am able to dance nearly like a pro at most anything, but I can't dance ballet for shit.

As Amelia finishes up her performance, Zaria claps and smiles with a look of interest. Dammit! Though I might've danced a dance from her culture, Zaria is obviously more interested in ballet that her own dances. I'm such an idiot! If I had known she was coming today, I would've prepared better.

"Very good. You've definitely got talent." Zaria says to my friend.

Amelia nods and turns around with a huge grin on her face. Apparently she hadn't expected to get a compliment at all after my "graceful" dance.

Ms. Cullen looks back at her sheet and says the next name. Some preppy bitch who's always crushing over Rob Pattinson – and speaking of which, she's wearing a tight Edward Cullen shirt – and giving me, Christine, and Amelia a hard time for thinking that he wasn't right for the role. Sad part is, she wants to dance like I do. She thinks that if I'm graceful enough for the _Sakkri _or the _Sakkri'a'she_, then she should be. Which, actually, as she falls face first onto the ground after screwing up the first major move of the _Sakkri_, she's nowhere near ready to even dabble with the simplest moves of either dance.

The girl starts screaming in pain, seeing as she twisted her ankle during that huge screw up. Ms. Cullen sighs, gets her some Tylenol and an ankle brace, then starts giving her a lecture about dancing within her skill level as she sits down at the far end of the wall.

Ms. Cullen walks back over to where Zaria was standing, apologized – this time there was no response from the woman – and began calling people up again.

After nearly ten dances, Ms. Cullen says, "Zach Wright."

"All right!" Zach says happily as he bounds up to the center of the room.

He doesn't really dance for something he'd like to keep doing, he actually started dancing because he was on probation and needed something to do. So, here he is, three years later, still in the same dance studio. But, really he dances to amuse people, make them laugh. I suggested being a comedian, but he hates talking too much, so being a funny dancer works for him. Speaking of "funny dancing", he's doing some makeshift, intentionally crappy break dancing routine that's making everyone in the room – Ms. Cullen and Zaria included – laugh.

After watching the interesting display of Zach's non-existent break dancing skills for nearly four minutes, he stops lying face down on the floor. He rolls over and starts laughing at himself while trying to catch his breath.

Zaria is still laughing as she tells him it was interesting and funny, and that he could have a career in entertainment one day, but that was it. He doesn't mind though, he simply stands up and walks back over to us, a big smile on his face indicates that he fulfilled his goal in life to make a critic laugh. (Yeah, he's a weird guy, but he's still cool.)

"Finally, Christine Kuroda." Ms. Cullen says as she calls the last of my friends up.

Yeah, Christine is at the bottom of the bracket for our class, but she's still pretty good. We only have twelve people, so her being at the bottom really isn't all that bad, and she's always taken the position with a smile, just glad to be in the class.

As Christine is getting ready to dance, Zaria asks, "Kuroda is your surname?"

My friend nods. "Yes ma'am."

"Strange…you don't look Japanese." She thinks for a moment. "If you don't mind me asking, are you adopted?"

Christine laughs. "No, no, it's alright, I get that all the time. No, I'm not adopted. I'm half-Japanese on my father's side."

"Oh. Forgive me for interrupting. Please, continue."

Christine nods and begins dancing. True, she's not as elegant as most of the people here, but her skill level's definitely gone up. She's dancing a mock _Sakkri'a'she_ that I taught her just for special occasions. She stumbles and misses a few steps, but all else considered, she's really getting better. I might have to teach her the real _Sakkri'a'she _before too long.

As Christine ends, Zaria claps and looks impressed. She apparently had been expecting that same result as the last person who tried to mimic the _Sakkri_. "I'm impressed, um, I'm calling you Kuroda. That was really good, even for mock dance of what the first girl did. Good job, Kuroda."

Christine bows and says, "Thank you." She turns and runs back over to me, greeting me with a glomp and a "thank you" for teaching her that dance.

Ms. Cullen clears her throat and says, "Please wait a little while. I'm giving Mrs. Cobriana plenty of time to—"

"I've already decided." Zaria interrupts the teacher with this simple statement.

"R-Really? But, Miss Kuroda just got back over to the wall. Why don't you think about it?"

"I did. Like most dance critics in my culture, I based my decision on many things, mostly grace and elegance. Where I come from, we decide if a dance is good or bad while it's being danced. I decided who it was when Kuroda ended her dance."

Ms. Cullen seems speechless, that's weird. I can see her shiver though as she makes eye contact with Zaria. She steps back and allows the garnet-eyed woman to step forward.

Zaria pulls a medallion out her front pocket and says, "This medallion is the proof that I have chosen you. The person who receives this must wear it at all times. I will only tell the person I choose why this is. Now, please, step forward," she looks right at me, "Kayla Maser."


End file.
